Peerages in the United Kingdom

Until the creation of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom in 2009, the peerage also formed a constituent part of the British judicial system, via the Appellate Committee of the House of Lords.

All British subjects who were neither Royal nor Peers of the Realm were previously termed commoners, regardless of ancestry, wealth or other social factors.

This idea that status as a 'commoner' is based on title rather than bloodline correspondingly means for example that Princess Anne, who enjoys royal status as the daughter of Queen Elizabeth II, opted for her children (Peter Phillips and Zara Tindall) to be technically commoners (though functionally part of the untitled nobility) despite their being grandchildren of the then sovereign, when Anne and her husband, Mark Philips, declined the offer of peerage titles.

A hypothetical eldest son of the Duke of Norfolk can therefore be styled by courtesy as "Earl of Arundel" ("the" does not precede it, as this would indicate a substantive title).

While peerages remain part of the honours system, the main reason for creating new peers is for them to hold a seat in the House of Lords.

For example, in the early Stuart period, King James I sold peerages, adding sixty-two peers to a body that had included just fifty-nine members at the commencement of his reign.

Since then, ruling parties have instead exclusively created life peers and refrained from recommending any others to be elevated to a hereditary peerage, although this is simply present convention and there is nothing preventing future governments from doing so.

It is unclear in the present day whether the monarch would move to directly block a recommendation or a conventional ascension to the peerage, though they are constitutionally entitled to do so.

It was reported in 2023 that members of the British security services had contacted Queen Elizabeth II to request she intervene and block the peerage of Evgeny Lebedev who had been nominated by then Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

However it was alleged in 2020 that due to a personal reluctance by Queen Elizabeth II to award the Garter to Tony Blair other living prime ministers would not be raised either.

Succession claims to existing hereditary peerages are regulated by the House of Lords Committee for Privileges and Conduct and administered by the Crown Office.

The Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876 allowed for the appointment of Lords of Appeal in Ordinary – judges meeting specific criteria made peers for life – who formed the main body of the committee.

Judges appointed to the new Supreme Court are not automatically made peers, but those who have not previously been independently granted a peerage, are entitled to use a judicial courtesy title of "Lord" or "Lady", with a territorial designation, for their remainder of their lives.

The Earl Marshal is the only peer in England and Wales to retain a judicial function by right of office, as the sole judge of the High Court of Chivalry a civil law court with jurisdiction over matters of heraldry in England and Wales, though if not a professional lawyer, he normally appoints a professional lawyer as his lieutenant or surrogate.

The Lord Great Chamberlain is entrusted by the Sovereign with custody of the Palace of Westminster, the seat of the British Parliament, and serves as his or her representative therein.

Instead the granting of a peerage forms part of the honour system because it brings with it an honorific, title and style for life as a reward in overt recognition of the recipient's contributions to society, or some segment thereof.

Some country houses were gifted to peers "by the nation", such as Blenheim Palace for the 1st Duke of Marlborough and Trafalgar Park for the 1st Earl Nelson.

Historically, some hereditary peers used an entail in an effort to prevent their estate from being separated from the peerage titles by their heirs and reinforcing the practice of primogeniture.

The entail practice was essentially abolished by the early half of the 20th century, and many peers and members of the landed gentry had to sell their estates due to political and economic changes.

Peers may also use the Chapel of St Mary Undercroft at the Palace of Westminster for weddings and christenings for themselves and their families at the discretion of the Lady Usher of the Black Rod.

Through acts like the Quia Emptores of 1290 these powers were stripped back, and the authority to create titles was entrenched as exclusive to the monarch.

Magna Carta, first issued in 1215, declared that "No free man shall be seized, imprisoned, dispossessed, outlawed, exiled or ruined in any way, nor in any way proceeded against, except by the lawful judgement of his peers", and thus this body of greater Barons were deemed to be "peers" of one another, and it became the norm to refer to these magnates as a "peerage" during the reign of Edward II.

Feudal baronies had always been hereditable by primogeniture, but on condition of payment of a fine, termed "relief", derived from the Latin verb levo, to lift up, meaning a "re-elevation" to a former position of honour.

They have historically been associated with the English landed gentry and squirearchy within the context of the class structure of the United Kingdom and many peers may also be Lords of the Manor.

In 2018 five daughters of hereditary peers took the government to the European Court of Human Rights to challenge the laws that stop them from inheriting their fathers titles and thereby being elected to the House of Lords.

[21] The only remaining peerages with certain associated rights over land are the Duchy of Cornwall (place), which appertains to the Dukedom of Cornwall, held by the eldest son and heir to the sovereign, and the Duchy of Lancaster (place), which regular income (revenue) appertains to the Dukedom of Lancaster, held by the sovereign whose government owns the capital and all capital gains on disposals.

[citation needed] Ducal coronets include eight strawberry leaves atop the chaplet, five of which are displayed in heraldic representations.

Other feudal monarchies equally held a similar system, grouping high nobility of different rank titles under one term, with common privileges and/or in an assembly, sometimes legislative and/or judicial.

In France, the system of pairies (peerage) existed in two different versions: the exclusive 'old' in the French kingdom, in many respects an inspiration for the English and later British practice, and the very prolific Chambre des Pairs under the Bourbon Restoration (1814–1848).

It was the primary symbol of lordship and effectively reserved only for the three tiers of kings (provincial, regional, local) and for those princely and comital families descending from them in control of significant territories.